HOW'S YOUR NEWS?

There's a very telling moment in How's Your News?, a documentary following five mentally handicapped and disabled journalists on a road trip across the USA. Ronnie Simonsen, an amiable guy with cerebral palsy, has corned a tight-lipped fellow leaning against his pickup somewhere in the farming heartland. This guy doesn't have much to say, giving one word answers, and wondering who the hell this "reporter" is. Ronnie asks the guy what he likes to do, and he mumbles, "Well, I guess I like to ride my motorcycle." And before you know it, Ronnie has suckered him into a motorcycle "roleplay" when his impression of The Fonz finally gets the guy to crack a smile.

And that's the magic of the reporters in How's Your News? With man-on-the-street style interviews, they catch their subjects at their most unguarded. This could mean seeing our reporters get gawped at, brushed off, or simply ignored. But some people do stop and talk, and the results are hilarious, baffling (to us and the reporters), or make you wince.

One of the more cringe-inducing bits involved Susan Harrington, a mildly mentally disabled woman who is legally blind, but happens to have a fabulous singing voice (she will often burst into song, making up tunes about the places that she visits). With microphone in hand, she approaches a grumpy older man, sitting on a curb. In her ever-chirpy interviewer voice, she inquires of him whether there are any nice places to visit in his town. "I hate this town..." he grumbles before going on an extended, and very bitter rant. Turns out he's unemployed, a vet, and has been living on the street, getting beat up in alleys and such. This time it is the interviewer's extreme deer-in-headlights discomfort caught on tape. Susan even comments in the DVD extras how she felt at the time, getting trapped in a horrible interview situation—every journalist's worst nightmare.

But our heros always come out unscathed in the end, which in a way is a huge relief. As the film's audience, you end up worrying that the reporters will end up talking to hostile or cruel people. Maybe those people weren't included in the film, or maybe the worse that happened to the reporters was that they were simply ignored (see the scene of Larry Perry—who has severe cystic fibrosis, leaving his body crumpled and twisted in a wheelchair and unable to communicate verbally—waving a microphone with a shaking hand at passerby ignoring him on a busy street).

The disc is loaded with extras, the most fun being the inevitable (and hoped for) scene of Ronnie getting to meet his number one idol of all time, 1970s TV actor Chad Everett, who practically has a supporting role in the film considering how much his name is mentioned in reverential tones. Their meeting on a beach in California is really quite touching. Also fun is Susan and Sean Costello (down's syndrome) interviewing Trey Parker and Matt Stone, who were fans of early How's Your News? tapes and produced the film. You can see that Parker and Stone are genuinely delighted to talk to Susan and Sean, even when Sean once again goes blank when it comes to coming up with a follow-up question.

Overall, How's Your News? is an entertaining road movie, with very likeable and refreshingly different stars. I have to admit, the trip looked like loads of fun. Heck, who wouldn't want to check out an alligator farm, a livestock auction, or Venice Beach? Sign me up!